Ovarian cancer is one of the most common forms of neoplasia in women. Early diagnosis and treatment of any cancer ordinarily improves the likelihood of survival. However, ovarian cancer is difficult to detect in its early stages, and remains the leading cause of death among women with cancer of the female reproductive tract.
The low survival rate of ovarian cancer patients is in part due to the lack of good diagnostic markers for the detection of early stage neoplasms, and in part due to a deficit in the general understanding of ovarian cancer biology, which would facilitate the development of effective anti-tumor therapies. The present invention overcomes these shortcomings by providing much-needed improvements for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention ovarian tumors, based on the identification of a series of ovarian tumor marker genes that are highly expressed in ovarian epithelial tumor cells and are minimally expressed in normal ovarian epithelial cells. Over 75% of all ovarian tumors, and about 95% of all malignant ovarian tumors, arise from the ovarian surface epithelium (OSE). Because the tumor marker genes are broadly expressed in various types of ovarian epithelial tumors, the present invention should greatly improve the diagnosis and treatment of most ovarian cancers.